Every unit has a base attack time (BAT), which refers to the default interval between attacks for an unbuffed unit with 0 agility and no attack speed bonus. For example, a melee lane creep has a BAT of 1.00 seconds, and thus attacks once every second by default. Similarly, if a hero with 1.7 BAT had 0 agility and no bonus attack speed, they would attack once every 1.70 seconds. While nearly every unit can have their attack speed modified, only a few heroes can actively change their BAT.

The reciprocal of base attack time is base attack speed. For most heroes, this is 1 / 1.7 = 0.588 attacks per second. Attack speed is expressed in percent of base attack speed. The base is therefore expressed as 100. Each point of increased attack speed (IAS) adds 1 to that, giving 1% of base attack speed. Each point of agility increases IAS by 1. IAS is also modifiable by items, abilities, buffs, and debuffs. Attack speed works together with BAT to determine how often a unit can attack.

Attack speed caps of 20 and 700 are reached with -80 attack speed reduction and with +600 increased attack speed respectively, since every unit has a base attack speed of 100.

Note: When mousing over attack damage in the HUD, the first field shows the attack speed and the time per attack in parenthesis. The attack speed field is defaulted to 100 and adds the IAS afterward, leading to a lower boundary of 20 and an upper boundary of 700. Even though the display may show a unit to "exceed" these boundaries, the actual attack speed used for calculations will still obey the caps of 20 and 700. This can be easily verified by observing that the "time between attacks" display does not change even when pushing well past "700 attack speed".

Note2: Units that do not have 1.7 BAT will display their attack speed differently in the in-game HUD as if they had 1.7 BAT. For example, a unit with 0.85 BAT and no bonus attack speed (100 attack speed) will display itself as having 200 attack speed, because 0.85 seconds is how long a unit with 1.70 BAT and 200 attack speed would take in between attacks. This strange quirk makes it harder to figure out if a hero without 1.7 BAT is nearing the attack speed cap, but it does allow players to compare this uniform "attack speed metric" across all heroes more easily (only their base attack time though, as any bonuses are not expressed in this "attack speed metric", but just added on top).

Attack Speed Bonus: 100Duration: 5When it is cast on an enemy. Affects self. Only grants attack speed against the targeted enemy. Bonus is lost after 4 attacks or within 5 seconds, whichever is shorter.

Attack Speed Bonus: 450Duration: 20Affects self. Only grants attack speed against the targeted enemy. The buff is not lost upon switching target, so it continues to give attack speed upon switching back to it.

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